 We have a powerful potential in our youth and we must have the courage to change old ideas and practices so that we may direct their power towards good ends. That's according to Mary Bethan. Welcome to The Advocate, where thought-provoking topics are discussed with no holds barred. Here on Plus TV Africa, we basically call a spade by its name. I'm talking about the Nigerian youth becoming an endangered species and we change something about it. Joyce is advocating for the gap year in our education system and in the same vein, Anitong is talking about the reality surrounding entry-level jobs. Felix is talking about crucial conversation being the drivers for good leadership and finally Tonya is asking if taking loans from banks of industry is worth it. Sit back and after this break, we'll be here to dissect it all, stay with us. Nigerian youth, an endangered species. Have you ever heard the lyrics, if you don't get money, hide your face? Maybe you don't listen to youthful rhythms of Nigeria, which on its own will be a shame and very sad. Have you heard the words, after money, now money remain or who principle help? What about this one, any way, now way? If you do not know any of this, then I dare conclude that you are far from the streets, far from reality, far from the youth. These are the slangs that are vibing the streets right now. While many celebrate the youth, and I also do, I believe we need a clinical look at the youth. Their activities, their thoughts, their way of life, we celebrate the little achievements but fail to identify the big threats of the youth generation. Now, do not get me wrong, I'm not generalizing to say the youth are a failure. I'm saying they need help. Currently in Nigeria, the youth seem to have an issue with critical thinking, processes and procedures, respect, honor, patience, hard work and other relevant values. They collapse under pressure, get agitated and even violent or get violent a lot of times. Let me bring it home. I had gone to a gas station to fill up my gas. The attendant was in there so I went in search of the attendant. After about 4 minutes or so, I found him and he began to dispense the oil or the gas. There comes a young chap, probably in his early 20s or teenage years. He puts his cylinder in front of the attendant, ahead of the two other cylinders he found on the queue. So the attendant asked him if he was the first and I asked him politely to wait his turn. He gave me a look that says it all. Few weeks ago, in an estate, a young man got down from his car and beat the security officer at the gates. According to him, he delays in opening the gate for him. He beat him on his way out and when he was coming back, the security guard said, since you get power to beat me and my body still depend me, come down and open the gate yourself. He got down, hired an extra hand and the security guard was given another round of beating. Now, what is interesting is that his father is the vice chairman in the estate. Nigerian youth is fast becoming an endangered species. Respect, decency, commitment, personal principles, which serve as milestones and caution on the way to adulthood is missing. A lot of youth are not engaged in purposeful living. The danger of that is dire. They live for now. Make a hammer syndrome as it is. How did we get here? When we were young, we had adults we looked up to, people we aspired to be like. There are very few people the youth aspire to be like right now. Not because they do not exist anymore, but because the society has not identified them as heroes. As a child, on the cover of notebooks, you would find the image of someone in an academic gown or an image that depicts aspiration of a child. Now, on the cover of the same notebook, you would find sportsmen and women, entertainers, and the list goes on. Now, listen, I'm not saying they're not heroes, but the nation is not built on entertainment, sports, and celebrity status. As a society, who are we modeling our children after? What do we aspire or inspire our youth to participate in? Every year, we organize a reality show that promotes insane exposure, lack of self-control, and the list goes on. Those that disrespect the entity called marriage yet as a people, we were only able to organize one edition of the Apprentice Africa, and other programs like Next Titan struggle year in, year out to survive. What do you say to society where winners of an educational quiz competition get a laptop and 500,000 Naira, yet winners of a reality show go home with prizes worth tens of millions of Naira, not to mention the motivational speaker status. They become a mini-Joyce Daniels, though they have no experience and very little to offer. Radio and TV stations dedicate programs to discuss events in the house. Media houses even place some minutes of these shows on their program. Yet, during a show like Next Titan, it won't even get news mentioned. As a people, we've succeeded in pushing our youth to a corner, and as a youth, they're enjoying the corner with the song, one corner, one corner, we'll be itty-bitty. Unknown to them, it is to their detriment. Those in their forties need to rise up now, shed off the pressure of economy, and face the imminent threat. You all need to pick two teenagers to mentor and show the ropes, because if you think marriages are breaking at an alarming rate right now, do wait for 20 years. If you think we have touts on the street now, do wait for 20 years. If you think our political leaders are selfish, the evil is yet to come. My name is Elua Kaedeh, and I volunteer to support the youth. That was long. I just had to calm my heart, having... Oh, and there's so many elements of that. Look, like really, what did the youth have to look forward to, right? The future has been stolen away. It's been stolen. The things that should be in place for them are not there anymore. There's nothing in the bank for them. So what are their options? There are no jobs for them to go into. The government has not built the capacity of many sectors that would naturally employ them coming out from university, even talking about the ones that went to university. And for those ones who you want to study a vocation, how many of those are now available? Because those businesses have not sustained. They've not been able to keep up with what's going on with the economy. So I come from the stance where, yes, I understand this youth threat, but are we surprised? I'm not surprised, and I don't blame the youth. Yes, they're really into all this slay mama, celebrity culture, but that's the thing that they can badly see that perhaps that can sustain them because they see people succeeding. Unfortunately, they don't know it's actually not that many that succeed in it. And it's the social media helps to kind of create this myth that actually if I do this, if I post this, or if I do this, or if I follow this person's track, me too, I go hammer. And that's not the reality on ground. So I agree with you there, but I just don't blame them because really, if I was their age, I'm not sure I'd be any different. My question is what happened to the young man who beat up the security guard? Was he reprimanded by his parents? Are his parents being role models to him? I get the type who beat up the staff when they are angry. What has he been saying? So I always like to come back home first before I go too far to the role models on TV. We have role models right in front of us who are our parents. What are they doing? Yes, I know that many parents are out at work trying to make ends meet in quotes. End to what? Thank you. End to unruly children? So as parents, I want to bring it back home to all of us here. What are we doing? How are we modeling? Are we speaking with our children, to our children and listening to them? Or are we just telling them about how difficult things are out there? And they see us borrow? They see us grovel doing what we don't like? They see us gripe about the country. So who exactly are they supposed to turn to, to model them? They will go to the ones who make them happy, of course, and say, They won't turn now. No! Let's say we're happy or constantly standing them by telling them that all we do out there is for them. No! Let's check ourselves. Check yourself. The next time you tell your child that I'm working so hard to pay your fees, you are a bad role model and they will look outside. Okay, I'll just shoot the table. No, I see. This issue is all this day to my heart because it's destroying the very fabric that forms as a nation. I remember a couple of years back, I went to a place called Bukka in my university dinner. The university would be needing to get something to eat and I went to the restaurant and I saw that there was this music playing at the background, normal Nigerian secular music and a boy of about eight years or less singing and rapping with it in the restaurant. What's your name? Can you sing the national anthem? You said you can't. I said you are rapping this music. You can't sing the national anthem. So it's misplaced. We need to, we own it as a duty. We ourselves as advocates and older generations should look at life beyond their generation. How can they help upcoming generations to realign values? We don't want our country to be destroyed. Everybody is talking about money. You want to do something, how much should you pay? Was it all about money? I think the government, I'm going to say something about the government. I know yes, we only see government, government, government cannot do all. But this is where we want the government to be intentional about working with educational institutions and other relevant institutions to incentivize people with good values that have returned money that are not there on hand. It's not about giving them money. What are you going to do with the award? Member of the Federal Republic, order of Nainjah or Nites or whatever. What are we going to do to make them feel important as they are? Not necessarily. I must not be a comedian before I make it in Nainjah. Everybody must not be a comedian. I must say it's time to be a comedian. But why can't we just take our professions and our academic series as young people? So let's realign our values. Well, up next is Joyce after the break.